DEFIANT BIELSA VOWS TO DO IT HIS WAY...
MARCELO Bielsa insists he will not compromise on his footballing philosophy in his bid to take Leeds back to the Premier League.
Leeds have taken the Championship by storm under Bielsa this season, but their unbeaten start was halted by former boss Garry Monk’s Birmingham last week.
Birmingham defended in depth after racing into a two-goal, but Bielsa made it clear he would not change his approach as opposition managers try to nullify his side’s expansive style.
“You have two paths – either you risk playing and make a mistake, because when you play it’s implicit you can make a mistake,” Bielsa said. “The other path is you don’t play. This is a possibility too. Just imagine a game where both teams do not want to play. This is allowed in the rules – but this is not the spirit of the game.
“I assume my position regarding this problem. My position is to try to reach the beauty of the game. It’s a lot more difficult to reach the beauty when only one team wants to play.
“Please don’t misunderstand what I’m saying. The fact is, if you reduce spaces and don’t play – the rules allow you. I’m not complaining about that. I’m just talking about the difficulties we faced.”
Bielsa said he would rather lose a game by trying to win it than change his tactics and would not be adopting a more pragmatic approach.
“We could ask, for example, the fans of Leeds – what they would have preferred? Us to lose as we lost trying to overcome the opponent, even if we couldn’t play well, and assuming all difficulties we faced,” he said.
“Or would the fans have preferred we draw the game without playing because if we hadn’t played, we could have got one point.”